I picked up a new Early Access title at the weekend, and had to ponder which folder on here to put it in.

Ostensibly, it is a wargame in the theme of Running with Rifles. Your avatar is just one of an army (currently 60 per side but planned to increase) who are fighting in an ongoing campaign. The campaigns themselves can last for several days until one side or the other captures all the towns.

What makes it interesting though is that nothing, from a handgun to an artillery piece to a tank to a bullet, comes free. Everything has to be made, by both armies. This means logistics. Not every soldier is battling on the front-lines, instead a web of quartermasters, supply lines and logistics needs to go on behind the scenes to ensure that the machinery of war remains well-oiled. This is done by gathering scrap, sulphur and other ingredients and using the manufacturing facilities of towns to make the materials needed for the war effort, although not all towns have the requisite facilities which adds tactical depth. To send a tank to the front you must make the tank, shells, bullets and fuel then crew it with players and send it on its travels. It sounds onerous, but actually taking time to support the war effort is pretty enjoyable, especially as the war can encroach upon your little missions too. A bunch of you bag a truck, head out to gather whatever the QM is after, then do a few runs to bring back a stockpile.

The combat is fun, although I do have a slight beef with it. Due to the scale of the game, it is actually quite rare that you see any enemies. Each weapon has an 'aiming range' which is basically how far you can drag the crosshairs from your avatar. Rifles are pretty high, assault rifles less and pistols and SMGs very limited. They will all fire further of course, but you can only extend the view from your player by the aim range. There are mortars, artillery and binoculars in the game, which I haven't used but may give a better view, but for the most part you are laying down your own fire in the direction that enemy fire is coming from, without actually being able to see where your rounds are landing or who you are killing (or not). This in game terms doesn't matter: There is no K/D ratio, no message to advise who killed you (unless a TK), and while you do progress in ranks it only happens as a result of players commending your gameplay, there is nothing you can do to advance your own rank.

So yeah, an interesting title and one that I think has a lot of potential. I paid £15 for early access after watching a couple of Twitch streams and am enjoying myself for the most part. A few niggles, but a lot of promise.

A friend at work had said he'd spent all weekend with his cousin playing this and tried to get me to buy it... however a Snowy seal of slight approval could be the deciding factor. However I have bought so much stuff lately...

Reminds me of Planetside, massive world battles where support sort of comes into it. However I like that there is actually a win condition (unlike Planetside).I also agree with the worthabuy bloke about the online community. Might be my age but social etiquette just doesn't exist. Maybe I'm a dying breed as I notice my son doesn't have many qualms about doing things that I find horrible online. And he has me as a role model

It's a shame about the community issues, and frankly it puts me off. When there are important non-combat tasks to do and people on your own team are actively making them more difficult or outright preventing you from doing them, then fewer people are going to bother trying. As ever, success comes via the unsung heroes of logistics, rather than everyone getting together for heroic pushes on the front lines. It's just not as satisfying as it could be.

Raid wrote:It's a shame about the community issues, and frankly it puts me off. When there are important non-combat tasks to do and people on your own team are actively making them more difficult or outright preventing you from doing them, then fewer people are going to bother trying. As ever, success comes via the unsung heroes of logistics, rather than everyone getting together for heroic pushes on the front lines. It's just not as satisfying as it could be.

I have to say, I haven't seen any problems within the community, although that said I was told that it does happen in a chat with a guy streaming it on Twitch. He said it was fairly minimal but annoying when it happened. On spawning, I tend to hunt down someone ranked who is clearly working on something and asking if they need help. The community so far has been really nice in my experience. I have put a few other new players right (I read the Reddit on advice for newbs before starting), where they have been staggering under a weight of unnecessary gear that will likely be lost if they die, not to take too much. I can imagine though that if you work to, lets say, mine a load of scrap, refine it into parts and machine it into weapons and ammo only to have some Edwin steal the truck you are loading up so they can drive to the front, likely losing the truck, all the hard-earned supplies and wasting all the time you have spent, that it would be crushing.

I hope they also do something to increase the view range, as aiming at muzzle-flashes and not knowing whether the threat has been dealt with makes advancing very hit and miss. Pun intended.